Maria Writes In “How About Staying In The Stock Market?”

Steve Rhode — Mon, 17 May 2010 14:14:20 +0000

Maria

“Dear Steve,

This is not a debt question – it’s about staying in the stock market with all the current turmoil? Will you still answer it?

Maria”

Maria,

So much of what happens in the stock market is not based on logic or research, but innuendo, gossip and emotion. Just because the stock market is wildly gyrating at the moment is not necessarily a cause for concern as long as you are invested in professionally managed mutual funds.

In a professionally managed fund you have a professional looking over the investment and you are sharing your risk with a pool rather than on one or a few stocks.

My approach to the current situation is to not look at the value of my investments. It would make me ill to look now but I know that for me, I’m comfortable with the funds I’m in. I also know that what goes down, always goes up again, over time.

If you sell now, you’ll sell at a low price, and if you invest latter, you’ll buy back at a higher price. The opposite strategy than what you want to follow. If you are working with a major mutual fund company or Certified Financial Planner then you might want to talk to them to see if your current portfolio needs to be rebalanced.

The people I am most concerned about are those that depend on their stock investment for monthly income. It certainly makes the though of depending on a 401(k) or 403(b) scary as you near retirement. In that case you need to look to convert your portfolio into safer investments that don’t swing. But in high flying times it feels bad to move into T-bills that pay a low amount of interest when some other fund of investments is soaring.

Investing should be 90% logic and 10% emotion but it’s not.

I hope that helps.

Big Hug!

@GetOutOfDebtGuy

How to Get Out of Debt With the Get Out of Debt Guy » innuendo

Maria Writes In “How About Staying In The Stock Market?”

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